Is Climate Change, a modern tragedy of the commons?
The most inconvenient truth of all
1. The most
inconvenient
truth of all
climate change and indigenous people
A Survival International Report
2. introduction
Indigenous people are on the frontline of climate change. Living in parts of the
world where its impacts are greatest and depending largely, or exclusively, on
the natural environment for their livelihoods, culture and lives, they are more
vulnerable to climate change than anyone else on earth.
According to reports, the impact of climate change on indigenous people is
already being felt around the world: from the Arctic to the Andes to the Amazon,
from the islands of the Pacific Ocean to Canada’s Pacific Rim.
Equally important, but barely recognized, is the impact that measures to stop
climate change are having, or may have, on indigenous people. These
‘mitigation measures’ violate their rights and make it easier for governments,
companies and others to lay claim to, exploit and, in some cases, destroy their
land – like climate change itself.
This report is an exposé of these mitigation measures. They include:
1
• Biofuels
• Hydroelectric power
• Forest conservation
• Carbon offsetting
This report is published ahead of critical climate change talks to be held in
Copenhagen in December 2009. The purpose of the talks, organized under the
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), is to
finalise agreements on how to combat climate change when the current
agreement, the Kyoto Protocol, runs out in 2012.
What is ‘The Most Inconvenient Truth of All’? That the world’s indigenous
people, who have done the least to cause climate change and are most
affected by it, are now having their rights violated and land devastated in
the name of attempts to stop it.
‘The world is ill.
The lungs of the
sky are polluted.
We know it
is happening.’
Davi Kopenawa, Yanomami, Brazil
The Penan are just one of many tribes
affected by climate change.
3. 2
Climate change refers to the average rise in the
earth’s temperatures.1 The Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a scientific
body established to assess global warming, says
the evidence for it is ‘unequivocal’.2 It is more than
90% certain that ‘most of the global average warming
over the past fifty years’ is a result of human-induced
greenhouse gas emissions.3
According to the IPCC, the main cause of climate
change is the burning of fossil fuels, which emits
greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide.4
Deforestation, says the IPCC, is another major
source of carbon emissions.5 Forests act as
‘sinks’ that absorb and store carbon dioxide.
The IPCC lists, with varying degrees of certainty,
a number of impacts that global warming is having
on the planet.6 These include:
• Melting glaciers
• Melting ice caps
• Melting sheet ice
• Rising sea-levels
• Changing rainfall
• More frequent drought
• More frequent heat waves
what is climate change?
Deforestation of virgin forest
for crops such as soya and
oil palm not only devastates
the lands of many tribes but
also, according to the IPCC,
is another major source of
carbon emissions.
4. how are indigenous
people affected?
3
‘Mother Earth is no longer
in a period of climate change,
but climate crisis.’
The Anchorage Declaration, 2009.8
The Amazon
In 2005 a severe drought struck the Amazon
rainforest, home to hundreds of indigenous peoples
such as the Yanomami. Experts predict less rain,
more frequent droughts, and higher temperatures.7
‘The rains come late. The sun behaves in a
strange way. The world is ill. The lungs of the
sky are polluted. We know it is happening.
You cannot go on destroying nature. We will
all die, burned and drowned.’ Davi Kopenawa,
Yanomami leader and shaman, Brazil.9
The Arctic
The Inuit have said for years that climate change
is affecting their land.10 Their whole way of life
depends on ice – and now it is melting.11 Hunting
and fishing have become more difficult, travel
between villages dangerous, the existence of their
homes precarious.12 According to media reports,
earlier this year one village belonging to the Yup’ik
(a people related to the Inuit) announced it would
be forced to relocate after flooding.13
‘Inuit have a traditional juggling game. The
weather is sort of like that now. The weather
is being juggled; it is changing so quickly and
drastically.’ N. Attungala.14
‘It has become so serious that several coastal
villages are now actively trying to figure out
where to move entire communities.’ Patricia
Cochran, Inuit woman and chair of Indigenous
Peoples’ Global Summit on Climate Change.15
Saami reindeer herders from Finland, Norway,
Russia and Sweden report that herd numbers
are declining, reindeer are finding it more difficult
to access food, and are more likely to fall through
thinning ice.16
‘Traditional weather reading skills can’t be
trusted any more. In the olden times one could
see beforehand what kind of weather it will
be. These signs and skills hold true no more.
Old markers do not hold true, the world has
changed too much now.’ Veikko Magga.17
Reindeer herder, Siberia, Russia
5. 4
‘Many aspects of Saami culture
– language, songs, marriage,
child-rearing and the treatment
of older persons – are
intimately linked with reindeer
herding. If reindeer herding
disappears, it will have a
devastating effect on the whole
culture of the Saami people.’
Olav Mathis-Eira.18
Nenets reindeer herders from the Russian Arctic
say they are facing increasingly unpredictable
weather.19 According to media reports, their annual
pilgrimage last year, involving thousands of reindeer,
was delayed because the ice over a key river was
not thick enough to cross.20
‘The snow is melting sooner, quicker and
faster than before. The changes aren’t good
for the reindeer and ultimately what is good
for the reindeer is good for us.’ Jakov Japtik.21
Canada
According to one report, rising temperatures in
Canada have led to what scientists have called
the largest insect infestation in the history of North
America.22 It has destroyed millions of acres of pine
trees that indigenous people like the Tl’azt’en
rely on.23
‘Millions of acres have been destroyed with
direct, immediate and serious impacts on our
safety and well-being, communities and entire
eco-systems, including salmon spawning and
rearing streams and migration routes.’
Tl’azt’en man, Ed John.24
According to reports, the Gitga’at are experiencing
increasingly unpredictable weather, affecting the
way they obtain and prepare their food.25
‘They don’t even know what to do with
this weather!’ Gitga’at woman, Canada.26
6. How are mitigation measures
affecting indigenous people?
5
‘These so-called ‘solutions’
to climate change are grabbing
our land and devastating
our territories.’ 27
Many different measures are being taken in the
name of combating climate change. Some of these
are ‘formal’ measures agreed to by signatories to
the UNFCCC’s Kyoto Protocol. Others are
‘voluntary’, taken by multilateral organizations,
governments and companies.
Biofuels:
Not so ‘green’ for the Guarani
Biofuels are being promoted as an alternative,
‘green’ source of energy to fossil fuels, but much
of the land allocated to grow them is the ancestral
land of indigenous people. It has been estimated
that if biofuels expansion continues as planned,
sixty million indigenous people worldwide are
threatened with losing their land and livelihoods.28
One of the biggest victims of the biofuels craze
is the Guarani tribe in Brazil. The Guarani, some
of whom featured in the award-winning film
‘Birdwatchers’29, are Brazil’s biggest tribe and were
one of the first to be contacted by Europeans five
hundred years ago.
Brazil’s President Lula is expanding sugar
cane cultivation in order to convert it into ethanol
to meet energy demands. The stated aim is to
make Brazil more energy self-sufficient and
reduce fossil fuel consumption as a means of
combating climate change.
‘Biofuels are an effective weapon in the fight
against global warming,’ Lula said at the Fifth
Summit of the Americas held in the Caribbean
this year. ‘Our society demands renewable, clean,
inexpensive fuels. The production of sugar cane
ethanol increases energy security.’30
In September, Lula stepped up his attempts to
‘green’ biofuels by announcing a proposal to ban
sugar cane production in the Amazon rainforest.
This would make Brazilian ethanol made from
sugar cane ‘100% green’, said Brazil’s Environment
Minister Carlos Minc – meaning that no more
rainforest would need to be cut down to grow it.31
Oil palm plantation, Peru. Much of the land used to
grow biofuels such as oil palm is the ancestral land
of tribal peoples.
7. 6
But the Guarani, having already lost much of their land
to sugar cane plantations and cattle-ranchers, are now
threatened by Lula’s plans for more than forty new
plantations. Many of these will be planted on ancestral
land claimed by the tribe.
The effects have already been catastrophic. In the
last six years at least eighty children have died from
starvation.32Once the owners of 350,000 sq. kms.
of Mato Grosso do Sul state, many Guarani are
now camped on roadsides or on tiny parcels of
land surrounded by plantations.
‘The big sugar cane plantations are now occupying
our land. Sugar cane is polluting our rivers and
killing our fish. (It is increasing) suicides, mainly
among young people, alcoholism and murder,’
said Guarani leader Amilton Lopez during a tour
of Europe last year.33
Hydroelectric power:
‘Damming’ Borneo’s hunter-gatherers
Like biofuels, hydroelectric power (HEP) has been
identified as a major source of alternative energy to
fossil fuels. But the construction of large hydroelectric
dams in the name of combating climate change is
destroying indigenous land and driving people from
their homes.
In Borneo, Malaysia’s government promoted the
construction of the enormous Bakun dam as a source
of ‘green energy’ and part of the country’s effort to stop
global warming. The dam is due to be completed next
year and will flood 700 sq. km of surrounding land.
The Bakun dam ‘is very much in line with the objective
of reducing and containing global warming as well as
reducing acidity in rain at the local and regional levels,’
said ‘Green Energy for the Future’, published by the
Malaysian prime minister’s office.34
In Brazil, the Guarani have been forced off their
land and many now live by the side of the road.
‘Thus the project serves as the country’s positive
contribution to the protection and enhancement of
the global environment, in line with the Framework
Convention on Climate Change. . . Compared to fossil
fuels, hydropower is much cleaner and friendlier.’35
But the dam displaced 10,000 indigenous people,
including many members of the Penan tribe. The
relocated Penan, semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers,
are now unable to hunt or gather and struggle to
support themselves on tiny plots of land, some
of which include swamps and rubble.36
‘In our old homes we could easily find food,
but living here is very painful,’ a Penan man
called Deling, one of those displaced by the Bakun
dam, told a Survival researcher this year. ‘We used
to eat three times a day, but here it is very
difficult. Once a day.’
8. 7
Hundreds more Penan and other tribal people face
the same fate following plans, leaked on the internet,
by the Sarawak government to build more dams.
The first of these, the Murum dam, is currently
under construction: hillsides are being dynamited,
the Penan are being told they must leave.
Like Bakun, government ministers are appealing
to HEP’s ‘clean’ credentials to justify the project.
‘Hydropower is the cleanest renewable energy
the world has. Since we have it, why not develop
it?’ said government minister James Masing, just
after the plans were leaked.37
Six members of the Penan were arrested in
September after trying to voice their opposition to
the Murum dam to Sarawak’s chief minister. ‘The
forest areas and resources that support our lives will
be destroyed,’ said a statement from the Penan.38
Forest conservation:
Thousands of hunter-gatherers
to be expelled
An international appeal to save the Mau Forest in
Kenya has been launched by Prime Minister Raila
Odinga after thousands of hunter-gatherers from
Kenya’s Ogiek tribe were told to abandon their
homes there.
Years of illegal settlement have devastated much
of the forest, a crucial source of water to millions
of Kenyans. But the government’s plans for it involve
evicting everyone resident there, including the Ogiek,
who have lived in the forest sustainably for hundreds
of years.
In its appeal to the international community for
funding to save the forest, Kenya’s government
is citing climate change as a key motivation. This
year, Kenya has experienced devastating droughts,
leading to severe power and food shortages.
‘The water from the dam will flood our traditional
lands including our villages, gardens, paddy
fields, farmlands and graves etc. . . We will be
forced to move to an area that we do not know
and is not compatible with our life conditions.’39
The Murum Dam is under construction, and
many Penan will be forced to leave their land.
‘Years of rampant excess in the global and
local mismanagement of our environment have
contributed to the melting of ice caps on Mt Kenya
and the vast destruction of our once-beautiful
forests,’ Odinga told the UN in September.40
Odinga said that Kenya was acting to ‘reverse the
ravages’ of global warming and cited Kenya’s efforts
to save the Mau Forest as an example.41 ‘No agenda
is as important to the country today as that of climate
change. Conservation has moved to the top of our
national agenda.’ 42
Kenya has also announced its intention to plant
7.6 billion trees, some of which are destined for
the Mau Forest.43 The carbon stored in these trees
could become financially very valuable in the carbon
market – while the forest’s ancestral residents,
the Ogiek, go homeless.
9. pretext they are destroying the forest. In late October
2009, some reports suggested the government was
backing down on its intention to evict the Ogiek, in
the face of widespread international condemnation.
At the time of writing, the Ogiek’s fate
remains unclear.
8
‘Everyone has been living in fear for the last
month... People are crying about the eviction.
The government said it would spare no one,’
said Kiplangat Cheruyot, of the Ogiek People’s
Development Program.
Kenya’s government has repeatedly tried to evict
the Ogiek in the past, usually on the misplaced
‘This is very serious. The Ogiek
have nowhere else to go.’
Kiplangat Cheruyot, Ogiek, Kenya.
Carbon offsetting:
Indigenous people without rights?
Attempts to stop deforestation have led to the
proposal of various schemes known collectively as
‘Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Forest
Degradation’ (REDD). A REDD scheme is currently
being discussed by the UNFCCC, may be finalized
at Copenhagen, and is expected to play a key role in
the post-Kyoto agreement to fight climate change.
The basic principle of REDD is to encourage
‘developing’ countries to protect their forests by
‘developed’ countries paying them. One way of
doing this is for the carbon stored in these forests
to generate ‘credits’ that ‘developed’ countries
can buy to offset their carbon emissions.
Indigenous people have repeatedly voiced concerns
about REDD because it could place enormous
monetary value on their forests and spark a land
grab. A large proportion of the world’s forests,
liable for inclusion in REDD schemes, are traditional
indigenous territories.
‘REDD will increase the violation of our human
rights, our rights to our lands, territories and
resources, steal our land, cause forced evictions,
10. 9
prevent access and threaten indigenous
agriculture practices, destroy biodiversity
and culture diversity and cause social conflicts,’
said the International Forum of Indigenous Peoples
on Climate Change (IFIPCC).44
REDD could make it more difficult for indigenous
people to have their land rights recognized, or
more likely for their rights to be undermined or
ignored where already recognized. If it does not
lead to evictions, it may well restrict traditional
use of land or access to natural resources.
It is not clear if REDD will even recognize
indigenous rights. In the UNFCCC’s current draft,
references to the UN’s Declaration on Indigenous
Rights and indigenous peoples’ rights to free, prior
and informed consent are in brackets. Whether they
are included in the final text may depend on the
Copenhagen summit.
‘If there is no full recognition and full protection
for indigenous peoples’ rights, including the
rights to resources, lands and territories, and
there is no recognition and respect of our rights
of free, prior and informed consent, we will
oppose REDD,’ said the IFIPCC in September.45
According to reports, many indigenous people have
already suffered from carbon projects on their land.
These ‘voluntary’ projects, outside the UNFCCC,
have led to evictions from their ancestral homes,
the destruction of villages and resources, violent
conflict, harassment, injuries and reports of deaths.46
Recommendations
Where they affect indigenous peoples,
measures to mitigate the impact of climate
change must:
• Involve indigenous people fully and
draw on their unequalled knowledge
of their environments.
• recognize and respect indigenous
rights as enshrined in international
law (ILO Convention 169) and the
UN Declaration on the Rights of
Indigenous Peoples, particularly their
right to the ownership of their land and
their right to give or withhold consent to
developments in their territories.
REDD schemes could
place a huge monetary
value on the world’s
forests and spark a land
grab, leaving indigenous
peoples with nothing.
11. Footnotes
1 The IPCC’s official definition is: ‘. . . a change in the state of the climate that can be identified by changes in the mean and/or the variability of its
properties, and that persists for an extended period, typically decades or longer. It refers to any change in climate over time, whether due to natural
variability or as a result of human activity. This usage differs from that in the UNFCCC, where climate change refers to a change of climate that is
attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere and that is in addition to natural climate variability
observed over comparable time periods.’ IPCC, 2007.
Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report, p. 30
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_ipcc_fourth_assessment_report_synthesis_report.htm
2 Ibid. p. 30.
3 Ibid. p. 72.
4 ‘Technical Summary’, Contribution of Working Group 1 to the IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report, 2007, p. 23-25.
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_ipcc_fourth_assessment_report_wg1_report_the_physical_science_basis.htm
5 IPCC, 2007.
Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report, p. 36
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_ipcc_fourth_assessment_report_synthesis_report.htm
6 Ibid p. 30
7WWF, 2007. The Amazon’s Vicious Cycles, p. 4.
8 Indigenous Peoples’ Global Summit on Climate Change, 24 April 2009 http://www.indigenoussummit.com/servlet/content/declaration.html
9 The Guardian, 13 June 2009. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/jun/13/davi-yanomami
10 S. Watt-Cloutier, Inuit Circumpolar Conference (ICC), speaking to the UNFCCC, 7 December 2005.
http://inuitcircumpolar.com/index.php?ID=318&Lang=En
11 ‘Satellite data since 1978 show that annual average Arctic sea ice extent has shrunk by 2.7 (2.1-3.3)% per decade, with larger decreases in
summer of 7.4 (5.0-9.8)% per decade.’ IPCC, 2007, Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report, p. 30
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_ipcc_fourth_assessment_report_synthesis_report.htm
12 Petition to the Inter American Commission on Human Rights seeking relief from violations resulting from global warming caused by acts and
omissions of the United States, 2005. http://inuitcircumpolar.com/index.php?ID=316&Lang=En
13CNN, 28 April 2009 http://edition.cnn.com/2009/TECH/science/04/24/climate.change.eskimos/index.html
14 Arctic Climate Impact Assessment http://www.eoearth.org/article/Nunavut_climate_change_case_study#Introduction
15 BBC, 4 January 2007. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6230731.stm
16 Arctic Climate Impact Assessment. http://www.eoearth.org/article/Kola:_the_Saami_community_of_Lovozero_climate_change_case_study
& Arctic Climate Impact Assessment
http://www.eoearth.org/article/Sapmi:_the_communities_of_Purnumukka%2C_Ochejohka%2C_and_Nuorgam_climate_
change_case_study
17 Arctic Climate Impact Assessment
http://www.eoearth.org/article/Sapmi:_the_communities_of_Purnumukka%2C_Ochejohka%2C_and_Nuorgam_climate_change_case_study
18 Tebtebba, 2008. Guide on Climate Change and Indigenous Peoples, p. 72.
19 The Guardian, 20 October 2009. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/oct/20/arctic-tundra
20 Ibid.
21 Ibid.
22 International Indian Treaty Council, 2008. Climate Change, Human Rights and Indigenous Peoples, p. 19
23 Ibid. p. 19-20. See also http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/18/science/18trees.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1
24 Ibid. p. 20
25 Salick, J and A. Byg, 2007. Indigenous Peoples and Climate Change, p. 16.
http://cmsdata.iucn.org/downloads/indigenous_peoples_climate_change.pdf
26 Ibid. p. 11.
27 Indigenous Peoples’ Guide: False Solutions to Climate Change, 2009, p. 2.
http://www.carbontradewatch.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=262&Itemid=36
28 Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, chair of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, email to Survival, 29 April, 2008.
29 For more information: http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/3672
30 China View, 19 April, 2009. http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2009-04/19/content_11212325.htm
31 BBC, 18 September 2009. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/8262381.stm
32 Campo Grande News, 17 December 2008. http://www.campogrande.news.com.br/canais/view/?canal=8&id=242815
33 Survival transcription and translation.
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